I kept myacatrallied right under my veins–just in case. Hale huffed as we neared the top, where a single door came into view. An odd thrum of power seeped from the other side.
The door opened with a croak, as if the hinges themselves told us to tread carefully. Dust and soot marred every inch of the cluttered room. A rectangular table littered with half-melted candles, jars of bones and dirt, and some glowing green substances even I couldn’t identify, took up most of the space. Shelves crammed withheaps of scrolls, scraps of parchment, and books of every size bordered each wall, expanding from the creaky floor to the cobwebs branching out from the ceiling. There were skulls of various shapes and sizes dispersed amongst the tomes, and I realized with an uncanny chill that there was agargoyleskull, with short brown horns, being used as a bookend. I shot Sparrow a warning glance, but she only squinted, shushing me, as Hale ushered us in with a buoyant chuckle.
We clustered around the table, Lenna and Sparrow more at ease than me. Hale gave Lenna a shy smile as he shut the door, and she positivelybeamedat him in return. I felt like I climbed up a staircase to a completely alternate realm. Taking up a quill, Hale began scrawling furiously on a piece of parchment, presenting the writing to Sparrow. “Are these the words Adara spoke?”
Sparrow scanned the writing before nodding, pulling out our own notes to compare. Hale bowed his head over the scribbles again, his bushy eyebrows knitted in concentration. Absentmindedly, he picked up a jar of bones and shook them, the sharp sound making Lenna jump. “The spells would be written in runic form in the book, but with the pronunciation from your notes, compared to these runes you saw, my best guess is that this spell book came from the Larimar Islands originally.”
“How did you learn to read runic spells?” I asked, my curiosity finally getting the better of me.
Hale smiled, gently placing the jar of bone fragments back down onto the table. “My ancestors come from a very ancient lineage of fae called the M’ghoen. They were dubbed throughout history as the ‘Spell Weaver Fae.’ My father’s direct lineage can be traced back to the M’ghoen who used to live in the Larimar Islands. My mother was human, she came over from the Slate Kingdom when she was young–meeting my father when they were both in their thirties. I came along quickly after Carraconfirmed their soul tie.” His hearty laugh made Lenna grin up at him. “The M’ghoen have been gone for thousands of years, but their history has been verbally passed down through the ages. My father was a scholar, and he made it his life’s work to travel to the Larimar Islands and learn as much as he could about the fae tribe that lived there. He never published any of his findings, since the laws here state that spell work is forbidden, but he used to tell me stories, and through the years, he began teaching me how to translate spells and read ancient languages.”
“How would my sister have gotten her hands on a book of spells potentially from an entirely different Kingdom?” I wracked my brain to figure out how this even made sense, coming up short with any feasible answers.
There were seven Kingdoms in all, each ruled by a different royal family, and rarely interacted with any type of warmth or friendliness. The Obsidian and Opal Kingdoms were the only Kingdoms where one royal family ruled the entire continent–Irridessen. The Slate Kingdom was directly south of Irridessen, mostly unaware of the existence of magic, and was not considered during times of war as an ally or an enemy. With the large amount of humans living there, the Slate Kingdom was never seen as a real threat to any Kingdom where magic was prevalent.
The Larimar Kingdom, usually called the Larimar Islands, sprawled off the coast of the Opal Kingdom, an archipelago that intertwined its own rich history with a motley of varying cultures. There was a steady peace between Irridessen and the Larimar Islands–but that was moreso a formality due to the closeness of their borders. To the west of the Obsidian Kingdom, separated by the wild seas, Ingotheria loomed. The biggest continent consisted of three separate Kingdoms. The Ruby Kingdom lay imposingly off the coast of the Slate Kingdom and allied closely with the Topaz Kingdom. With those two empires hosting thelargest standing armies, ruled under the iron wills of their royal families, most diplomatic talks with Irridessen ended in all-out brawls. The Jade Kingdom kept to themselves, self-governed by four deadly Witch Covens, and better off left alone.
For some type of artifact to be given to the Opal Kingdom from the Larimar Islands was odd, but at least we weren’t dealing with witches. My blood chilled at the thought.
“The book may have been given as a sly threat or a gift to a Kingdom that would never be able to translate the dark secrets it held. Or the book may have been discovered in the Larimar Kingdom and taken to the Opal Palace as a piece of antiquated history.” Hale shrugged, picking at a piece of soot on the wooden tabletop. “This spell is written in a very old dialect if these runes are correct, and is the same spell that you heard spoken. Unfortunately, it’s one that I hoped would never see the light of day. It’s a mirroring spell.”
I looked at Sparrow, alarm registering on her face. “That’s how Adara was able to use your illusion magic to create daggers out of her nails.”
“How would she be able to do that?” I directed my question at Hale.
“If she’s able to pull that magnitude of spell off without killing herself in the process, it would be relatively easy. All she would need is some hair or blood from the being whose power she wanted to mirror.” The next words out of Hale’s mouth made my skin crawl. “But since you are twins, she wouldn’t need anything from you. Lineage-wise, the same blood that runs through your veins, runs through hers–making the spell much more volatile, yet much more serious.”
“With that spell, could she transfer something like…a soul tie?” My voice was barely louder than a whisper, my heartbeat pumping in my ears.
Hale considered the question for a long time, rubbing his stubby fingers over the jawbone of some sort of dead animal. “With that single mirroring spell? It would come down to the gritty technicalities over actual spell work yet… If she was strong enough, it’s a possibility. But there would be other factors to consider based off the elements of the soul tie in question.”
Lenna took the quill and ink from the table, sliding the parchment over before fixing Hale with a determined stare. “Like what?”
Hale hemmed and hawed for a minute, before replying, “The spell would need a significant amount of power to replicate Carra’s magic. She would most likely need the blood of the being soul tied to you, maybe an additional sacrifice for a boost of power, and I would hazard a guess that it would need to be a special full moon. One with infinitely more power than a regular, monthly moon. From there, she couldpotentiallyuse the spell to mirror a shadow of the soul tie from you to her. But if it didn’t work, both you and your mate would be killed in the process.”
“A shadow?” Sparrow repeated, as Lenna transcribed the information on the parchment. Hale silently pushed the ink bottle closer to her.
“A shadow,” he confirmed. “Alike in every way except the way that truly matters, that Carra did not bestow the soul tie to Adara. Meaning to try and replicate it to complete the transfer… It could potentially kill all three of you if Adara isn’t powerful enough.”
Pieces started clicking into place in my brain. Adara had been relatively quiet since I was exiled a year ago, and there hadn’t been anything momentous about the last few full moons. But the next moon…
I hissed, the realization dawning on me as dread settled into my throat, “Adara’s been biding her time waiting on thenext full moon–the Soul Moon. If she tried to complete the spell with the Soul Moon, would she have enough power to pull it off?
“I hate to be the one to say this, my Queen, but…it would give her power an edge.” Hale said quietly, not meeting my eyes.
Each month’s full moon honored a different god or goddess, on top of celebrating Carra and her gift of soul ties. But only one month a year was the moon venerated as fervently as the impending Soul Moon. The moon for the month Carra herself was born.
The most powerful moon of the year.
The moon where the majority of soul ties bloomed.
Sparrow paled, her tattooed hand covering her mouth, as she calculated the date. “Meer, the Soul Moon’s in three days.”
My chest constricted as, suddenly, time seemed to speed up, my thoughts zinging around my mind, shrieking. I couldn’t get a full breath down.
Adara was going to attempt to transfer my soul tie in three days.
I felt sick, I felt hot.
